North London Railway - West Hampstead


The North London Railway (Hampstead Junction Railway) leaves West Hampstead Station and runs south westwards.

Post to the east West Hampstead
Post to the west Kilburn

This posting covers only the north west corner of this square


Iverson Road
The part of the road from West End Lane to Maygrove Road was built by Midland Railway. The rest was built by the British Land Company
202-220 These are probably Heysham Cottages built in the site of West End House for railway workers.
West End House. The big house around which the hamlet of West End grew. In the 1ate 18th it was owned by the Beckford family - although it is not thought that either Alderman Beckford or his scandalous son William lived there.  The house was bought by the Midland Railway in 1866 and let to the railway contractors, it was later used as accommodation for railway workers. Some of it - called the Old Mansion - became the station master's house for what was then West End Station. The rest was bought by the British Land Company and demolished.
West Hampstead power signal box.  1977. An early example of a new type by. S. Wyatt, British Rail Regional Architect.  Very large; red brick and steel cladding.
190 Innisfree Housing Association
Garden Centre alongside the railway, now closed
128 Mural – abstract on the wall facing the park


Liddell Road
Trading and light industrial units on the site of part of the West End railway sidings. This was a large area – mainly to the west of Liddell Road used by the Midland Railway for marshalling goods traffic and distribution – mainly dealing in coal.

Linstead Street
Harben School. This was opened in 1881 by the School Board for London as Netherwood Street Board School. A Cookery centre was added by 1895. In the 1920s it was reorganised as The Harben School and in 1951 became Harben Secondary Modern and Harben Primary Junior and Infants – which closed in 1955. The Secondary school closed in 1961, and it became the lower school of St. George’s Roman Catholic Secondary school.  It is now flats.
Kilburn Grange Children’s Centre.  tange of children’s spaces - Outdoor play areas, etc. Designed by Meadowcroft Griffin 2006.

Pandora Road
21 plaque to Alfred Harmsworth, Viscount Northcliffe 1865-1922. 'Journalist and newspaper proprietor, lived here'. Harmsworth lived here, from 1888, for three years, published "Comic Cuts" and "Answers to Correspondents" and planned his future newspaper empire. The plaque was erected in 1979.


Railways
The three railway noted in the previous square continue across this area.
The Midland, Thameslink line continues westwards turning towards the north. It had a large marshalling yard and distribution centre to the south of the line, noted above.
The North London Line, Hampstead Junction Railway, continues in a south westerly direction
The Metropolitan Line, now London Underground and including the Jubilee Line continues westward, crossing the North London Line

Sherriff Road
Alexander Sherriff was a director of the Metropolitan Railway and of the London Permanent Building Society.
St.James. Built in 1885-8 by A. W. Blomfield. In red brick inside and out.
West Hampstead Studios. Artists’ accommodation built in 1884 by Messrs Pincham and Owers with an imposing frontage.

West End Lane.
It was a pleasant country drive for Queen Victoria. . In 1879 was still a semi-rural place
West Hampstead Station. This opened in 1888 and now lies between Finchley Road and Frognal and Brondesbury on the North London Line. It was originally West End Lane Station on the line from Hampstead to Willesden. The name was changed in 1975. The station received a major refurbishment towards the end of 2007 as part of the London Overground takeover.
West Hampstead Thameslink Station. Built in 1871 it now lies between Kentish Town and Cricklewood on the Thameslink Line. Initially in 1871 this was just a halt in the area at the end of what was a stretch of cobbles running from Iverson Road. For a short period from 1878 the station formed part of the Super Outer Circle in which Midland trains ran from St.Pancras to Earls Court via Acton and Turnham Green. The Midland Railway originally opened it as ‘West End’ with long platforms to allow main line trains to stop and some trains ran to Kings Cross rather than St. Pancras.
In 1904 it was renamed ‘West End and Brondesbury’. In 1905 it became just ‘West Hampstead’.  By 1945 it was on the London Midland and Scottish Railway and built as a prototype with wall panels clipped to prefabricated sections and designed by L. Martin and R. Llewellyn-Davies under W.H. Hamlyn. Rebuilt 2012 by Landolt and Brown with special measures over a line of lime trees

Sources
Day. London Underground
Field, London Place Names,
Hillman. London Under London
London Borough of Camden. Web site
London Encyclopaedia
London Railway Record
National Archives Web site
Pevsner and Cherry.  London North
Robins.  North London Railway
St. James. Web site
Willesden History Society, Newsletter

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